Hello and welcome to the first edition of my Get to Know series! To start it off, I wanted to start with someone very well known, and probably one of the most famous U.S. Presidents, Abraham Lincoln. Besides the convenience of having so much information about his life on the internet, he is a very interesting and important figure in United States history.
Please note that I will be writing about the information I find most interesting and beneficial to the post! These will be shorter biographies on historical figures. If you’re interested in all of the details, please see my citation list at the bottom of the post. With that being said, I hope you enjoy this post and series. Thank you for reading!
Early Life
Two – hundred – fourteen years ago, Abraham Lincoln was born in a one – bedroom log cabin in Kentucky (1). He was the son of Thomas Lincoln and Nancy Hanks (2). Seven years after his birth, his family moved to Indiana (shout out!), where they built their home (2). Like most children, Abe had chores to do. Whether it was clearing fields, feeding the crops, hunting or fishing (which he apparently loathed), he got the job done (2). This is just my opinion, and I’m sure others have thought it too, but I believe growing up this way taught him how to be a hard worker, determined, and played a part in him becoming the President we all know (and some love).
Although his childhood seemed normal, and everything was going well, tragedy struck the Lincoln home. In the fall of 1818, when the leaves turn yellow-ish orange and the summer heat starts cooling down a bit, Abraham’s mother passed away (2). At nine – years – old he watched as his mother was laid to rest in the nearby forest (2). Losing a loved one is always sad, but I can’t imagine it being so early in life like this. Fortunately, he persevered. According to Richard N. Current of Britannica.com, Abe’s father, Thomas, re-married and brought a new mother into the home for his children. This also played a big part in his life. It is stated in this piece that Lincoln and his step-mother were very fond of each other, and that she even encouraged his taste for reading (2). This would come in handy later in his life when he went on to become a lawyer.
Education and Occupation
Before studying law, Lincoln’s “formal schooling – a week here, a month there – did not amount to one year, and mostly he educated himself by borrowing books and newspapers (3).” Isn’t it incredible how much he was able to teach himself over the course of his life? Imagine hardly any schooling and then one day you end up being President of the United States. It’s crazy! But that’s what he did.
Lincoln’s yearning for knowledge led him down an incredible, and historic, path in life. Through his studies he taught himself law. According to Biography Online, Lincoln spent eight years in Illinois working on the Illinois court circuit. This led him to become one of the most respected people on the circuit and is where his famous nickname “Honest Abe” comes from (1).
In 1847, Abraham Lincoln was elected to the House of Representatives for Illinois, where he served from ’47-’49 (1). Lincoln’s time in the House was short – lived, but he appears to have tried to do many things. For instance, according to Britannica, he “proposed a bill for the gradual and compensated emancipation of enslaved people in the District of Columbia”. However, this could only be effective if it gained the support and approval of the “free white citizens (2)” who lived in D.C. And because it ticked off abolitionists as well, it was never seriously considered (2).
Lincoln was also a critic of President Polk throughout his term. When the President wanted to use “patriotism and military glory (1)” to shield his “unjust action of taking Mexican territory (1)”, he challenged that notion which ultimately cost him his House seat.
In 1858, after returning to Illinois to practice law once his term in the House of Representatives was over, Abraham Lincoln was nominated for a Senate seat by the Republican voters (1). During that time he participated in very prominent debates with Stephen Douglass, the Democratic incumbent, who was arguing for the “extension of slavery – if citizens voted for it” (1). In my opinion, it appears Lincoln’s opponent was kind of riding – the – fence on the slavery issue. Either you are in favor of extending it or you are not. However, I could be wrong. He could simply have not had an opinion and was going to do what the people decided. I don’t know. I’m no historian!
Ultimately, Lincoln did was not elected to the Senate. However, he put his skills on display for all to see, and it caught the eye of the Republican Party (1).
Presidency
Although he lost the Senate race, there were whispers throughout the Republican party about possibly nominating Lincoln as the presidential prospect for the 1860 race for the White House (2). When the time came, he ended up being nominated for President at the RNC (Republican National Convention), which was in Chicago at the time (2).
Because of this, Lincoln had to step away from his law practice and made winning the Presidency his number one priority (2). As we all know, he ended up winning and became the sixteenth President of the United States. However, it was not an easy ride for him. Right from the start South Carolina “proclaimed its withdrawal from the Union”, according to Britannica. This had a good chance of continuing throughout the southern states, so what else was there to do besides compromise?
“The most important, the Crittenden Compromise, included constitutional amendments guaranteeing slavery forever in the states where it already existed and dividing the territories between slavery and freedom” (2). According to Current, the author of the piece I am citing, Lincoln did not object to the first of the amendments, although he persistently challenged the second, and any plan overstepping in the slightest upon the “free-soil plank of his party’s platform”.
When it was all said and done, the Republican’s in congress took President Lincoln’s advice and decided to vote against dividing territories (2). Soon after, six more states seceded and joined South Carolina to create the Confederate States of America (2).
Keep in mind this was all happening before Lincoln even moved into the White House. This was a messy situation and he needed to find a way to fix it quickly. At the end of his inaugural address, Lincoln spoke to the Southerners who did not show up: “You can have no conflict, without being yourselves the aggressors” (2).
Soon after, as we all know, the civil war began in America. It was the deadliest war in American history, with 600,000 men dying – which is more than World War I and World War II combined (3)
End of Life
Once Robert E. Lee and the Confederate Army surrendered, the civil war in the United States was finally over. From there, President Lincoln tried to reunite the country (1), which is a very difficult task. We’re still trying to do that to this day!
According to Biography Online, President Lincoln “helped pass through Congress a bill to outlaw slavery. The Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was officially signed into law on December 6, 1865.”
This is what President Lincoln is most famous for. He wanted every man, woman and child to be equal. It did not matter what color your skin was (or is. speaking to present day). I feel as if our country has started to go backwards in recent years. People are focusing more on race and our differences rather than what we have in common and how we are all equals in this country. It’s sad to see, but I believe America is so great. And because it is so great we will, hopefully soon, stop thinking of people by their race or ethnicity, and start thinking of them as Americans/humans. We really could be an amazing country if we all worked together. Anyways, there’s my little spiel for the day lol!
According to the History Channel (4), President Lincoln’s untimely death came only six days after the civil war ended. For those that do not know, President Lincoln was at Ford’s Theatre with this wife, when John Wilkes Booth assassinated him right where he sat (1). I can’t imagine what that must have been like for his wife and the people around the country. Such a horrible tragedy.
Lincoln is recognized as one of the most prominent and significant President’s in America’s short history, and is viewed as personifying the ideals of honesty and integrity (1).
I hope you enjoyed this first edition of my Get to Know series! Please share and subscribe if you did.
Thank you for reading, I appreciate it! Please see below for the citation list
Peter
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Works Cited
- https://www.biographyonline.net/abraham-lincoln.html
- https://www.britannica.com/biography/Abraham-Lincoln
- https://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/disp_textbook.cfm?smtID=2&psid=3062
- https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/president-lincoln-dies
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